Acts 28:23 - Meaning and Application

Here is a brief account of a long discussion Paul had with the Jews in Rome about the Christian faith. They were already biased against it because it was spoken against everywhere, and they called it a sect, a small religious group. Even so, they were willing to hear Paul out, which was more than the Jews in Jerusalem would do. It is likely that these Jews in Rome, with broader experience and more contact with the world, were more open in their questions than the hard-line Jews in Jerusalem.

Paul handled this meeting with care and courage as he defended the Christian faith. The Jews set the day for the discussion, so everyone involved had time to prepare (Acts 28:23). Their choice to set a time suggested they were ready to consider the matter, though that did not mean they all truly were.

When the day came, many people came to Paul. Even though he was a prisoner and could not go to them, they were willing to come to his home. His imprisonment, if they thought about it rightly, should have strengthened his message rather than weakened it, because it showed that he truly believed what he preached and thought it worth suffering for. A person should be willing to visit a man like Paul in prison just to receive instruction from him. Paul made room for them in his lodging and did not fear offending the authorities, so long as he could help these hearers.

Paul spoke at length and with fullness, aiming more at their conversion than at defending himself. He explained the kingdom of God, showing its nature and its glorious purpose. He made clear that God’s kingdom is heavenly and spiritual, seated in human hearts, and it does not show itself in outward display but in pure hearts and holy lives. What had kept the Jews from believing was often a false idea of the kingdom of God, as if it came with outward spectacle. Once that was set out clearly, they would be brought toward obedience.

Paul did more than explain the kingdom of God, he also testified to it. He plainly declared it and backed it up with solid proof, showing that the kingdom of God, ruled by the Messiah, had come and been established in the world. He also pointed to the powerful work of grace, using his own experience as part of his witness. He showed how that kingdom had changed him and brought him under its rule.

He also persuaded them. He pressed the matter on their consciences and urged them earnestly to receive the kingdom of God and stop resisting it. This kind of preaching, where explanation and proof are followed by strong personal appeal, is the best and most useful way to speak. He persuaded them concerning Jesus, since the whole purpose of his message was to bring them to Christ, prove that he is the Messiah, and lead them to believe in him as the gospel offers him.

Paul urged upon them the things concerning Jesus, including the prophecies about him that he read from the law of Moses and the prophets, showing that they pointed to the Messiah. He showed how all of them were fulfilled in Jesus. Since he was speaking to Jews, he argued from the Old Testament Scriptures. These Scriptures, far from working against Christianity, are its strongest proof. When we compare the history of the New Testament with the prophecies of the Old, we must conclude that Jesus is the one who was to come, and we should look for no other.

Paul also spent a long time with them, from morning until evening, it seems. It may have been eight or ten hours of speaking. The subject was rich, he was deeply engaged in it, and it mattered greatly to him. He was sincere, his heart was set on it, and he knew he might not have another chance like this. So, without asking their pardon for taking so much time, he kept them there all day. It is also likely that he spent part of that time in prayer with them and for them.

The effect of this message was mixed. One might think that so strong a cause as Christianity, presented by Paul so skillfully, would have won everyone at once. But it did not. The child Jesus was set for the fall of some and the rising of others, a stone that some would build on and others would stumble over.

They did not even agree among themselves (Acts 28:25). Some thought Paul was right, while others refused to accept it. This was the division Christ said he would bring, the fire he came to kindle (Luke 12:49, Luke 12:51). Paul had spoken clearly and plainly, and yet his hearers could not agree about what he meant or what his evidence proved.

Some believed what was said, and some did not (Acts 28:24). That was the division. The gospel has always had this kind of response. To some, it is a message that brings life; to others, it brings death. Some are changed by the word, while others are hardened by it. It was the same with Christ’s own hearers and with those who watched his miracles, some believed and some blasphemed. If all had believed, there would have been no division. So the blame rested on those who would not believe.

At the end, Paul gave them a warning word to think about after they left. He could see from their murmuring that many of them, perhaps most, were stubborn and would not yield to what he had said. As they began to get up and go, he said, in effect, “Wait, take one more thought with you. What do you think will happen if you keep refusing to believe? What will be the end of it? Where will it lead?”

He told them they would, by God’s righteous judgment, be fixed in their unbelief. They were hardening their own hearts, and God would harden them too, as he did Pharaoh’s. This, Paul said, had already been foretold about them. He pointed them to the Scripture in Isaiah 6:9-10 and told them to read it seriously and tremble, lest that warning should come true in their own case. As the Old Testament contains gospel promises that are fulfilled in all who believe, it also contains gospel warnings about spiritual judgments that will come on those who do not believe, and this is one of them. This was part of the prophet Isaiah’s commission: he was sent to make worse those who would not be made better. The Holy Spirit spoke well through Isaiah to their fathers.

What is spoken by the Lord is here said to be spoken by the Holy Spirit, which shows that the Holy Spirit is God. What was first said to Isaiah is also said to have been spoken to their fathers, because Isaiah was told to give the people God’s message. Even though that message carried fear for the people and grief for the prophet, it is here described as well said. Hezekiah, king of Judah, spoke that way about a message of judgment: “The word of the Lord you have spoken is good” (Isaiah 39:8). And “he that believes not shall be damned” is part of the gospel just as much as “he that believes shall be saved” (Mark 16:16).

This can also be explained by our Lord’s words, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you” (Matthew 15:7). The Holy Spirit said to your fathers what would be fulfilled in you: “Hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand.” Their great sin against God was theirs too, and it was this, they would not see. They shut their eyes against the clearest evidence possible and refused to accept the conclusion, even though they could not deny the facts. “Your eyes you have closed” (Acts 28:27). This shows stubborn unbelief and a willing slavery to prejudice. As their fathers would not see God’s hand raised against them in judgment (Isaiah 26:11), so they would not see God’s hand stretched out to them in gospel grace.

It was true of these unbelieving Jews that they were biased against the gospel. They did not see because they had decided not to see, and no one is so blind as the one who refuses to look. They would not follow through on their own convictions, and for that reason they would not admit them. They deliberately closed their eyes so they would not see the great things that belonged to their peace forever. They would not see the glory of God, the beauty of Christ, the ugliness of sin, the beauty of holiness, the emptiness of this world, or the reality of the next. They would not be changed and ruled by these truths, and so they would not receive the evidence for them. They also stopped their ears, like the deaf adder that will not listen to the charmer, no matter how skillful he is. Their fathers had done the same thing, refusing to hear (Zechariah 7:11-12).

What they feared by shutting their eyes and ears was that they might understand with their heart, be converted, and be healed. They kept their minds in darkness, or at least in confusion and unrest, lest a serious and sober thought should show them how much it was both their duty and their good to be religious. Then, little by little, the truth might become too strong for them, and they might turn from the evil ways they enjoyed to the exercises they now disliked. God’s way is to make people see, then understand with the heart, then convert their will, and then heal them. That is the proper way to deal with a reasonable soul. Satan prevents people from turning to God by blinding the mind and darkening the understanding (2 Corinthians 4:4).

The case is very sad when the sinner joins Satan in this and puts out his own eyes. They gladly remain ignorant so they can sin more freely. They are in love with their disease and are afraid that God will heal them. Babylon was like that long ago: “We would have healed Babylon, but she was not healed” (Jeremiah 51:9). This was their sin.

The great judgment of God for this sin is this, they will be blinded. God will hand them over to a judicial hardening, a just condition of spiritual dullness. “Hearing you shall hear,” they will hear the word preached again and again, “but shall not understand it,” because they will not give their minds to it, and God will not give them grace to understand. “Seeing you shall see,” they will see many miracles and signs, but they will not grasp their force. Take care that what Moses said to Israel does not become true of you: “The Lord has not given you a heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, to this day” (Deuteronomy 29:4). And what Isaiah said to his own generation was just as severe: “The Lord has poured out on you a spirit of deep sleep, and has closed your eyes” (Isaiah 29:10-12).

Their resistance to God’s grace, their rebellion against the light, God’s withdrawing of grace and light, their refusing the love of truth, and God’s giving them over to strong delusion, all of this together brought this result. The heart of this people grew dull, and their ears became hard of hearing. They became stupid and insensitive, unmoved by anything said to them. No remedy works on them, and nothing reaches them, so their disease must be judged incurable and their case hopeless. How can people be happy who refuse to be healed of the very disease that makes them miserable? How can they be healed when they will not use the means of cure? How can they be converted when they will not be convinced of either their sickness or their remedy? And how can they be convinced if they shut their eyes and stop their ears?

Let everyone who hears the gospel and ignores it tremble at this warning. Once people are given over to hardness of heart, they are already near the edge of hell, because who can heal them if God does not?

Their unbelief would also clear God of blame in sending the gospel to the Gentiles, the matter they watched so jealously (Acts 28:28). Since they pushed God’s grace away and would not submit to the power of divine truth and love, and since they would not be converted and healed in the way God had appointed, Paul says, “Be it known to you that the salvation of God is sent to the Gentiles.” This salvation had once been given in a special way to the Jews only (John 4:22). Now the offer is made to the Gentiles, the means are given to them, and they are in a better position to receive it than the Jews were. It is sent to them, they will hear it, they will receive it, and they will be blessed by it.

Paul intended by this, first, to lessen their anger at the preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles by showing how unreasonable their complaint was. They were offended that the salvation of God was sent to the Gentiles and thought this was too great a favor for them. But if they thought so little of that salvation that they would not accept it themselves, then they could not honestly resent it being given to the Gentiles as though it were too good for them.

The salvation of God was sent into the world, and the Jews had the first offer of it. It was fairly presented to them and urged on them, but they refused it. They would not accept the invitation that came to them first, like guests invited first to the wedding feast, and they have only themselves to blame if others are invited instead. If they would not make the bargain or meet the terms, they should not be angry with those who would.

They cannot complain that the Gentiles received it over their heads or out of their hands, because they had already let go of it. More than that, they had turned against it. So the fault is theirs, for it is through their fall that salvation has come to the Gentiles (Romans 11:11).

Paul also wanted to turn their anger over the Gentiles’ favor into something useful, and to bring good out of that evil. When he wrote to the Romans about this same matter, the blessing the Gentiles received through the Jews’ unbelief and rejection, he said he mentioned it on purpose to stir his own people, the Jews, to holy envy, and so save some of them (Romans 11:14). The Jews had rejected the gospel of Christ and passed it on to the Gentiles, but it was not too late to repent of their refusal and accept the salvation they had ignored.

They could still say no at first and then take it later, like the older brother in the parable. When he was told to go work in the vineyard, he first said, “I will not,” but later he changed his mind and went (Matthew 21:29). If the gospel is going to the Gentiles, let us go after it rather than miss it. Will they hear it, who are thought to be far from hearing, and who have been so long like the idols they worshipped, with ears that do not hear? And should not we hear it, whose privilege is to have God so near whenever we call on him? Paul wanted them to reason like this, and to be shamed into believing the gospel by the welcome it received among the Gentiles.

If that did not move them, it would only make their judgment worse, just as it did for the scribes and Pharisees. When they saw tax collectors and prostitutes submit to John’s baptism, they did not repent afterward and believe him, though they should have (Matthew 21:32).

The assembly then seems to have broken up in some disorder. Some turned their backs on Paul. Those who did not believe were deeply stung by his last words, that they would be judged blind and that the light of the gospel would shine among those who sat in darkness. When Paul said those words, he had said enough for them, and they left. They were perhaps not as fiercely angry as some of their countrymen had been on similar occasions, but they were dull and unmoved, as little affected by his warning and comfort as the seats they sat on.

They left, and many of them likely resolved never to hear Paul preach again or to keep asking about the matter. They also turned against one another, because they had strong arguments among themselves. There was not only disagreement between believers and unbelievers, but also debate among the unbelievers themselves. Those who agreed to leave Paul did not agree on why they were leaving, and they argued sharply with one another.

Many people argue a great deal and still do not reason rightly. They can point out faults in one another’s views and yet refuse to yield to the truth. And arguments among themselves will not convince people unless God’s grace opens their minds.